The Literary Elements

1. The Literary Elements

2. Why Interpret? • Never forget that an author begins with a blank page • Everything put into the text makes a contribution to the author’s vision/perspective

3. Setting • Includes WHERE a story takes place and WHEN a story takes place • Can affect mood/tone

4. Plot • Sequence of RELATED events that happen in the story • Clearly build toward something ahead • CONFLICT (a struggle of some kind) is the most important element in the plot • Series of complications contribute to rising action

5. Plot (cont.) • Plot Diagram on board/paper • Exposition • Rising Action • Character in series of complications under a larger conflict • Climax • Point where the character faces most significant obstacle and responds • Falling Action • Denouement/Resolution (“unknotting”)

6. Conflict • Person vs. Nature • Person vs. Person • Person vs. Self • Person vs. Society

7. Foreshadowing • Hints in the text that clue us in to a significant plot event to come • Violent storms indicate violence to come in plot

8. Flashback • Interruption that takes us back to a previous event or experience in the plot or character’s life • Shift from president in oval office to a scene from his high school experience

9. Characterization • How a writer reveals a character’s personality • Direct Characterization: • Author tells us what the character is like (e.g. deceitful, honest, evil, kind) • Indirect Characterization: • Physical description • Words & thoughts • Other characters’ thoughts & comments • Character’s actions

10. Characterization • Dynamic vs. Static • Change or not • Round vs. Flat • Complex personality w/different traits, or easily summed up personality?

11. Characterization • Examine the character’s “journey” • Evolve/Devolve? • Grow or become diminished? • Better off or worse off beginning to end? • Much movement but same place? • What contributed to shaping character?

12. Symbolism • When the author uses objects, events, or characters to represent THE BIG PICTURE • Something in the story stands for something else - white hat/black hat • In the Bible, seeds eaten by birds stand for those who hear and don’t believe

13. Allusion • Reference to a well-known literary work or character • Bob and Sarah sure are a couple of star-crossed lovers • As Tiger Woods strolled through the crowd, it was like he was parting the white sea

14. Irony • Discrepancy between expectations & reality • Verbal Irony • Situational Irony • Dramatic Irony

15. Verbal Irony • Speaker says one thing but means another • “That Michael Jackson tattoo is really cool. It’s still sort of subtle and understated even though it covers your whole back.”

16. Situational Irony • What happens is the opposite of what’s expected • A woman is assaulted by a man, waits 35 years to get revenge, then falls in love with him the next time they meet

17. Dramatic Irony • Audience knows what the characters don’t • Character asks what punishment for her crime will be, thinking it will be a fine; audience knows the punishment will be death

18. Point of View • The angle from which the story is told • 1st person (I, we) • More intimate w/narrator • Tough to judge narrator? (Consider naïve & unreliable narrator) • 3rd person (he, she, they) • limited (1 character’s POV) • or omniscient (all-knowing)

19. Style • How it is said influences what it means • Diction (word choice) & syntax (word arrangement) influence mood/tone • Does it change the pace? • Does it suggest something about characters? • How’s it make the reader feel? Exhausted? Exhilarated?

20. Theme • The Author’s vision • What’s s/he saying about human nature, the way the world works, our relations to others? • It’s just one view & it’s up for interpretation • Death of the Author

21. Some Themes… • Justice prevails • Love conquers all • Society will always overwhelm the individual • Children often see more clearly than adults • There’s no place for the artist in the jungle